Project details

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CSC - Cost-sharing contracts

Objective

The conception of quantum computers and the development of concrete quantum algorithms substantiated the possibility that several computational problems can be solved more efficiently by exploiting the principles of quantum mechanics in the computational process. The main objective of this proposal is to better understand this additional power and to exploit it in full extent.

The proposal is broken down into four workpackages: Quantum algorithms and complexity, cryptography, fault-tolerant computation, information and communication theory. The expected results include new quantum polynomial time algorithms and few-qubit applications, complexity theory based quantum cryptographic protocols, better quantum computation codes, self-testing/correcting quantum programs, and the further extension of information theory, communication complexity and Kolmogorov complexity into the quantum domain. The conception of quantum computers and the development of concrete quantum algorithms substantiated the possibility that several computational problems can be solved more efficiently by exploiting the principles of quantum mechanics in the computational process. The main objective of this proposal is to better understand this additional power and to exploit it in full extent.

The proposal is broken down into four workpackages: Quantum algorithms and complexity, cryptography, fault-tolerant computation, information and communication theory. The expected results include new quantum polynomial time algorithms and few-qubit applications, complexity theory based quantum cryptographic protocols, better quantum computation codes, self-testing/correcting quantum programs, and the further extension of information theory, communication complexity and Kolmogorov complexity into the quantum domain.

OBJECTIVESThe main objective of this proposal is to study and exploit the advantage of quantum mechanical information processing devices over their classical counterparts. The specific objectives include the construction of new quantum algorithms, the best possible determination of the power of different models of quantum computing, the analysis of real life quantum cryptography, the study of cryptographic primitives based on quantum complexity assumptions, the investigation of realistic error models, the conception of high quality quantum computation codes and self-testing/correcting quantum programs, the better understanding of qubit entanglement as information carrier, the further extension of the classical theory of information and communication into the quantum world, and the development of quantum Kolmogorov complexity.

Since their subjects are complementary, they will be pursued in parallel. Their objectives are mostly theoretical; therefore we intend to achieve them by extensive collaboration among the participants. Theoretical breakthroughs are expected through the various contacts between the leading experts taking part in the project and the talented young researchers who will be brought in via the numerous postdoctoral and PhD positions it is offering. The first workpackage which is the biggest of the four deals with the algorithmical aspects of quantum computation what we intend to investigate in its broadest sense. While concentrating on new quantum algorithms including killer applications, we also plan to study different types of quantum machines, abstract complexity classes, idealized computation models such as black-box computation, and few-qubit applications. In the second workpackage we will concentrate on quantum dey exchange in real life scenarios and on protocols between mutually distrusting players, but we will also develop new directions that cryptography inevitably will have to take, such as computational complexity based quantum cryptography. In the third workpackage we will study different error models, better quantum computation codes and the feasibility of self-testing/correcting for quantum programmes. The fourth workpackage will investigate quantum channels for classical data transmission and the role of entanglement in quantum algorithmic information theory and in communication complexity.